Turkey wants Mosul offensive to end before Raqqah operation begins

Turkey wants the operation on Raqqah, Daesh’s main stronghold in Syria, to start after the Mosul campaign comes to an end, Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said yesterday.

“Turkey’s stance on the Raqqah operation is clear. It would be better both militarily and strategically to conduct this operation after the Mosul operation and Turkey’s ‘Euphrates Shield’ operation are completed,” Kurtulmus told reporters in Ankara.

Iraqi security forces and Kurdish Peshmerga fighters launched an offensive to recapture the northern city of Mosul on 17 October with air and ground support from the US-led coalition against Daesh.

Yesterday, Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook told reporters that it was important to continue to put pressure on Daesh in Raqqah.

“We all feel it’s important to maintain pressure on ISIL at this particular moment in time, while they’re feeling the heat in Mosul,” he said using another acronym for the group.

“We continue to talk on a regular basis with the Turkish leadership about the best approach to addressing the fight for Raqqah,” Cook said during a briefing in Washington.

“But we have to keep the pressure on and we have to move forward and challenge ISIL in its so-called capital of its caliphate,” Cook said.

Last week, the top US military commander in Iraq said there was a need to urgently move to isolate Raqqah because of concerns about the group using the city as a base to plan and launch strikes against targets abroad.